Solid state drives/disks (SSDs) typically read/write a storage media using several kilobytes chunks (e.g., 4 KB or 8 KB), or logical pages (L-Pages), in order to optimize flash media access. The typical sector size associated with magnetic drives (i.e., 512 bytes) is too small. For Self Encrypting SSDs the L-Pages are encrypted as a whole using a single Media Encryption Key (MEK). The MEK is normally determined as a function of logical block address (LBA). An entire LBA space is subdivided into one or more LBA ranges (referred to as “data bands” or simply “bands”). A unique MEK is used for encrypting data in each data band. Since the data in each data band is encrypted with a unique MEK, having a data band boundary that is not aligned on an L-Page boundary will necessitate that parts of the single L-Page be encrypted with different MEKs, contrary to the generally accepted scheme where the entire L-Page is encrypted as a single unit.
It would be desirable to have a method and/or apparatus to manage aligned and unaligned data bands in a self encrypting solid state drive that overcomes the problem described above.